New Hope for Preventing HIV Transmission

July 19, 2010

New Hope for Preventing HIV Transmission

A vaginal gel containing an HIV medication prevents women from being infected.

South African women who used a vaginal gel infused with the
antiretroviral drug tenofovir reduced their likelihood of getting the disease by
about 50 percent, according to a two-year study published today in the journal Science.

The finding comes after 20 years of searching for an
effective microbicidal gel and a number of failed clinical trials. The benefit of
a vaginal gel over condoms is that it puts women in control of protecting
themselves, rather than requiring a man’s permission. About 60 percent of new HIV infections in
Africa are in women and girls.

Bruce Walker, a Harvard Medical School professor who was not
involved in the study, said a cheer erupted when researchers unveiled their
findings to a small group of scientists last month in Durban. “This is the
first time that there’s been a tool that women can use to protect themselves
from becoming infected,” he said. “It’s a game changer.”

[…] The women who participated in the study – in the city of Durban and in the
rural community of Vulindlela, in the rolling hills of KwaZulu-Natal – used a
the gel up to 12 hours before and after sex. Usually their partners were not
aware of it. Tissue biopsies found levels of tenofovir that were 1,000 times
higher than they would have been in the blood if the drug had been taken by
pill, the team said.

Researchers will next evaluate the gel’s safety over the
longer term. Scientists are also exploring whether giving the drug in pill form prior to exposure can reduce infection more effectively.